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Maryland lawmakers approve automatic voter registration

Maryland lawmakers approve automatic voter registration

Maryland lawmakers gave final approval Wednesday to a bill that would automatically register residents to vote when they deal with certain state agencies, including when obtaining or renewing driver’s licenses.

Residents would have the ability to opt out from being registered to vote, and those who do register would be able to pick whether to join a political party or register as an unaffiliated voter.

The agencies that would have automatic voter registration include the Motor Vehicle Administration, the Maryland Health Benefit Exchange, local social service agencies and the Maryland Transit Administration’s mobility office.

The bill effectively changes the voter registration programs at those agencies from an “opt-in” system to an “opt-out” system, said Damon Effingham, acting director of Common Cause Maryland, which was one of the groups promoting the bill. The agencies already offer voter registration.

The House of Delegates voted 93-46 on Wednesday to approve the Secure and Accessible Registration Act, which had already cleared the state Senate on a 31-13 vote earlier this month.

Several Democrats stood and photographed the vote board as the tally lit up in the House of Delegates chamber. But not everyone was on board with the bill.

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Del. Joe Cluster, a Baltimore County Republican, said he thought the bill was “useless.”

“We already ask people if they want to register to vote or not,” Cluster said. “I hope people would vote red on this bill. We pass so many bills down here and I just don’t understand why we are doing this.”

The Motor Vehicle Administration said it could implement automatic voter registration at no extra cost to taxpayers, while some of the other affected agencies said it would cost them a little more. Nonpartisan legislative analysts disagreed, arguing that the agencies could implement the program with existing resources, because they already offer voluntary voter registration.

Ten states and Washington, D.C., already have automatic voter registration, and Maryland is among at least 15 states considering the issue this year, according to the Brannen Center for Justice at the New York University School of Law, which promotes the policy.

The bill now heads to Gov. Larry Hogan’s desk. It would take effect on July 1, 2019.

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And how many in the DMV will CHECK the legal citizenship of those registering to vote when they get their DL, or whether the Moron-land DA’s will do a damn thing to prosecute those who DO register to vote who are ILLEGALLY in the country, and thus LEGALLY are not authorized to register to vote, let alone actually vote.

Every time the Democrats do this they some how end up with a lot more votes. If you do not have to prove you are a legal American before you get to vote you manage to screw every legal voter out of there vote. You need a valid ID with a picture and prof citizenship before you get registered to vote.

Translation: this is their cute little way of making it possible for ILLEGALS to ILLEGALLY vote in our elections. The states who are pursuing this kind of UNCONSTITUTIONAL BS need to have ALL their votes THROWN OUT in every national election, until they start complying with Federal election laws. If the integrity of their votes is in question, they should NOT be counted. And if the LEGAL voters in those states get tired of being disenfranchised, maybe they will do something to REIN IN their Leftist LOON governors, legistlatures, etc. and put a STOP to their seditious BS.